1. "Do we really know what makes us healthy" by Gary Taubes published in the New York Times, September 16, 2007. The summary below comes from Peter Hooper's Stat 141 website.
The article
In 2006 Cold-fX ranked as the country's bestselling cold and flu remedy. In fact, many people claim that Cold-fX supposedly cleared their symptoms within 3-4 days. How do they know ? How can they say for sure that their cold symptoms were moderated because of that product? Maybe their symptoms would have cleared anyway as colds just come and go?
Two pharmaceutical researchers from UBC with a background in testing drug companies' claims tested the claims of the Cold-fX maker CV Technologies and concluded that there is no evidence that Cold-fX statistically reduced the percentage of subjects who ended up getting a cold. In the interesting article above their claims are countered by the company's president. The article is a good introduction to experiment design in undergraduate courses.
In 2007 Health Canada approved the CV Technologies claims that the product "helps reduce the frequency, severity and duration of cold and flu symptoms by boosting the immune system."